John McCain's Kevo

John Sidney McCain III (born August 29, 1936) is the senior United States Senator from Arizona, and a candidate for the Republican Party nomination in the 2008 presidential election.

Both McCain's grandfather and father were admirals in the United States Navy. McCain attended the United States Naval Academy and graduated in 1958. He was married in 1965. He became a naval aviator, flying attack aircraft from carriers. During the Vietnam War in 1967, he narrowly escaped death in the Forrestal fire. On his twenty-third bombing mission over North Vietnam later in 1967, he was shot down and badly injured. He then endured five and a half years as a prisoner of war, including periods of torture, before he was released following the Paris Peace Accords in 1973.

Retiring from the Navy in 1981, and moving to Arizona, McCain remarried and entered politics. In 1982, he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives from Arizona's 1st congressional district. After serving two terms there, he was elected to the U.S. Senate from Arizona in 1986. He was re-elected Senator in 1992, 1998, and 2004. While generally adhering to American conservatism, McCain established a reputation as a political maverick for his willingness to defy Republican orthodoxy on several issues. Surviving the Keating Five scandal of the 1980s, he made campaign finance reform one of his signature concerns, which eventually led to the passing of the McCain-Feingold Act in 2002.

McCain was a candidate for the Republican nomination in the 2000 presidential election, but was defeated by George W. Bush after closely contested battles in several early primary states. In the 2008 presidential election cycle, McCain was the Republican front-runner as the cycle began. He suffered a near-collapse of his campaign in mid-2007, due to financial issues and his support for comprehensive immigration reform. In late 2007, he staged a comeback. He won several key primaries during January 2008, and by the end of that month was the Republican front-runner once again. His lead was solidified by several victories on Super Tuesday in early February, and by the subsequent withdrawal of his closest competitor, Mitt Romney.

Early life and military career

Formative years and education

John McCain’s grandfather and father on board a U.S. Navy ship in Tokyo Bay, circa 2 September 1945John McCain's early life began at a military base. He was born on August 29, 1936 at Coco Solo Naval Air Station² in the then-American-controlled Panama Canal Zone to Navy officer John S. McCain, Jr. (1911–1981) and Roberta (Wright) McCain (b. 1912). His father and grandfather both eventually became United States Navy admirals.³ McCain has Scots-Irish ancestry.⁴

McCain's family (including older sister Sandy and younger brother Joe)² followed his father to various naval postings in the United States and the Pacific; altogether he attended about twenty different schools.⁵ As a child, John was known for a quick temper, an aggressive drive to compete and prevail,⁶ and later a defiant streak.⁷ In 1951, the family settled in Northern Virginia and McCain attended Episcopal High School in Alexandria.⁸ There he excelled at wrestling⁹ and graduated in 1954.⁷

Following in the footsteps of his father and grandfather, McCain entered the United States Naval Academy. He was a rebellious midshipman, and his career at the Naval Academy was ambivalent.¹⁰ He had his share of run-ins with the leadership, did not take well to being bossed, and received many demerits.¹¹ He competed as a lightweight boxer,¹² and he did well in a few subjects that interested him.¹¹[10] Despite his low standing, he was a leader among his fellow midshipmen.¹⁰ He wanted to show the same mettle as his naval forebears, and so he managed to graduate from the Naval Academy in 1958, though near the bottom of his class.¹³

Naval training, early assignments, first marriage, and children

John McCain's pre-combat duty began when he was commissioned an ensign. He spent two and a half years as a naval aviator in training,¹⁴ where he earned a reputation as a party man.⁵ Graduating from flight school in 1960,¹⁵ he became a naval pilot of attack aircraft. McCain then spent several years stationed in A-1 Skyraider squadrons¹⁶ on the aircraft carriers USS Intrepid and USS Enterprise,¹⁷ in the Caribbean Sea and in the Mediterranean Sea.¹⁸ During his training and deployments he survived two airplane crashes and a collision with power lines.¹⁸

On July 3, 1965, McCain married Carol Shepp, a model originally from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.¹³ McCain adopted her two children Doug and Andy,¹⁹ who were five and three years old at the time;¹⁷ he and Carol then had a daughter named Sidney in September 1966.²⁰[21]

McCain requested a combat assignment,²² and in December 1966 was assigned to the aircraft carrier USS Forrestal, flying A-4 Skyhawks.²³[24]

Vietnam operations

McCain's combat duty began when he was thirty years old. In Spring 1967, Forrestal was assigned to join Operation Rolling Thunder, a bombing campaign against North Vietnam during the Vietnam War.¹³[25] McCain and his fellow pilots were frustrated by Rolling Thunder's infamous micromanagement from Washington;²⁶ he would later write that "The target list was so restricted that we had to go back and hit the same targets over and over again.... Most of our pilots flying the missions believed that our targets were virtually worthless. In all candor, we thought our civilian commanders were complete idiots who didn’t have the least notion of what it took to win the war."²⁵

By then a Lieutenant Commander, McCain was almost killed in action on July 29, 1967 while serving on Forrestal, operating in the Gulf of Tonkin. He was at the epicenter of the Forrestal fire, when a rocket accidentally fired across the carrier's deck and hit planes, including McCain's which had been waiting to launch. McCain escaped from his burning jet and was trying to help another pilot escape when a bomb exploded; McCain was struck in the legs and chest by shrapnel.²⁷ The ensuing fire killed 134 sailors and took 24 hours to control.²⁸.²⁹ As Forrestal headed for repairs, McCain volunteered to join the short-staffed USS Oriskany.

Prisoner of war

John McCain was flying an A-4E Skyhawk like this one (from a different Oriskany squadron) in 1967, when he was shot down.
McCain being pulled out of Truc Bach Lake in Hanoi and about to become a prisoner of war.³⁰ October 26, 1967.John McCain's capture and imprisonment began on October 26, 1967. He was flying his twenty-third bombing mission over North Vietnam, when his A-4E Skyhawk was shot down by a Soviet-made SA-2 anti-aircraft missile over Hanoi.³¹[32]³³[34] McCain fractured both arms and a leg,³⁵ and then nearly drowned when he parachuted into Truc Bach Lake in Hanoi.³¹ After he regained consciousness, a mob gathered around, spat on him, kicked him, and stripped him of his clothes.³⁶ Others crushed his shoulder with the butt of a rifle and bayoneted him in his left foot and abdominal area; he was then transported to Hanoi's main Hoa Loa Prison, nicknamed the "Hanoi Hilton" by American POWs.³⁶[37]

Although McCain was badly wounded, his captors refused to give him medical care unless he gave them military information, beating and interrogating him.³⁶ Only when the North Vietnamese discovered that his father was a top admiral did they give him medical care³⁶ and announce his capture. His status as a POW made the front pages of The New York Times³⁸ and The Washington Post.³⁹

McCain spent six weeks in the Hoa Loa hospital, receiving marginal care.³¹ Now having lost 50 pounds, in a chest cast, and with his hair turned white,³¹ McCain was sent to a different camp on the outskirts of Hanoi⁴⁰ in December 1967, into a cell with two other Americans who did not expect him to live a week; they nursed McCain and kept him alive.⁴¹ In March 1968, McCain was put into solitary confinement, where he would remain for two years.³⁶

In July 1968, McCain's father was named commander of all U.S. forces in the Vietnam theater.² McCain was immediately offered a chance to return home early:³¹ the North Vietnamese wanted a worldwide propaganda coup by appearing merciful, and also wanted to show other POWs that elites like McCain were willing to be treated preferentially.³⁶ McCain turned down the offer of repatriation; he would only accept the offer if every man taken in before him was released as well.⁴² McCain's refusal to be released was even remarked upon by North Vietnamese senior negotiator Le Duc Tho to U.S. envoy Averell Harriman during the ongoing Paris Peace Talks.⁴³

In August of 1968, a program of severe torture methods began on McCain, using rope bindings into painful positions, and beatings every two hours, at the same time as he was suffering from dysentery.³⁶[31] McCain made an anti-American propaganda "confession" that said he was a "black criminal" and an "air pirate".³¹ He has always felt that his statement was dishonrable,⁴⁴ but as he would later write, "I had learned what we all learned over there: Every man has his breaking point. I had reached mine."³⁶ His injuries left him permanently incapable of raising his arms above his head.⁴⁵ He subsequently received two to three beatings per week because of his continued refusal to sign additional statements.⁴⁶ Other American POWs were similarly tortured and maltreated in order to extract "confessions",³⁶ with many enduring even worse treatment than McCain.⁴⁷

McCain refused to meet with various anti-war peace groups coming to Hanoi, not wanting to give either them or the North Vietnamese a propaganda victory based on his connection to his father.³⁶ From late 1969 on, treatment of McCain and some of the other POWs became more tolerable after disclosoures to the world press of the conditions to which they were being subjected.³⁶ McCain and other prisoners were moved around to different camps at times, and later cheered the B-52-led U.S. "Christmas Bombing" campaign of December 1972 as a forceful measure to force North Vietnam to terms.³⁶[48]

Altogether, McCain was held as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam for five and a half years. The Paris Peace Accords were signed on January 27, 1973, ending direct U.S. involvement in the war, but the Operation Homecoming arrangements for POWs took longer; McCain was finally released from captivity on March 15, 1973.⁴⁹

Return to United States

McCain's return to the United States reunited him with his wife and family. His wife Carol had suffered her own crippling, near-death ordeal during his captivity, due to an automobile accident in December 1969.⁵⁰ As a returned POW, McCain became a celebrity of sorts.⁵¹[36] The photograph at left of him on crutches shaking the hand of President Richard Nixon during a White House reception for returning POWs became iconic.⁵⁰

McCain underwent treatment for his injuries, including months of grueling physical therapy,⁵² and attended the National War College in Fort McNair in Washington, D.C. during 1973–1974.⁵⁰[15] By late 1974 McCain had recuperated enough to have his flight status reinstated,⁵⁰ and he became Commanding Officer of a large A-7 Corsair II Navy training squadron stationed in Florida.⁵⁰[15]⁵³ McCain's leadership abilities were credited with turning around a mediocre unit and winning the squadron its first Meritorious Unit Commendation.⁵² During this period, the McCains' marriage began to falter;⁵⁴ he would later say he was to blame.⁵⁴

Senate liaison and second marriage

McCain served as the Navy's liaison to the U.S. Senate, beginning in 1977.⁵⁵ Returning to the Washington, D.C. area, he became leader of the Senate liaison operation, and would later say it represented "[my] real entry into the world of politics and the beginning of my second career as a public servant."⁵⁰ McCain played a key behind-the-scenes role in gaining congressional financing for a new supercarrier against the wishes of the Carter administration.⁵⁶[52]

In 1979,⁵² McCain met and began an affair with Cindy Lou Hensley, a teacher from Phoenix, Arizona whose father was a wealthy Anheuser-Busch distributor.⁵⁴ By then McCain's naval career had stalled;⁵⁷ it was unlikely he would ever be promoted to admiral as his grandfather and father had been,⁵² because he had poor annual physicals and had been given no major sea command.⁵⁸

His wife Carol accepted a divorce in February of 1980,⁵² and the uncontested divorce occurred on April 2, 1980.¹⁹ The settlement included two houses, and financial support for her ongoing medical treatments resulting from the 1969 automobile accident; they would remain on good terms.⁵⁴ McCain and Hensley were married on May 17, 1980.¹³

McCain retired from the Navy on April 1, 1981⁵⁹ as a Captain.⁶⁰ During his military career, he received a Silver Star, a Bronze Star, the Legion of Merit, the Purple Heart, and a Distinguished Flying Cross.⁶¹

House and Senate career, 1982–1999

U.S. Congressman and more children
Living in Phoenix, McCain went to work for his new father-in-law Jim Hensley's large Anheuser-Busch beer distributorship as Vice President of Public Relations,⁵⁴ where he gained political support among the local business community,⁵⁵ meeting powerful figures such as banker Charles Keating, Jr., real estate developer Fife Symington III,⁵⁴ and newspaper publisher Darrow "Duke" Tully,⁵⁵ all the while looking for an electoral opportunity.⁵⁴ When John Jacob Rhodes, Jr., the longtime Republican congressman from Arizona's 1st congressional district, announced his retirement, McCain ran for the seat as a Republican in 1982.⁶² McCain faced two experienced state legislators in the Republican nomination process, and as a newcomer to the state was hit with repeated charges of being a carpetbagger.⁵⁴ Finally at a candidates forum he gave a famous refutation to a voter making the charge:

“ Listen, pal. I spent 22 years in the Navy. My father was in the Navy. My grandfather was in the Navy. We in the military service tend to move a lot. We have to live in all parts of the country, all parts of the world. I wish I could have had the luxury, like you, of growing up and living and spending my entire life in a nice place like the First District of Arizona, but I was doing other things. As a matter of fact, when I think about it now, the place I lived longest in my life was Hanoi.⁵⁴[63] „

A Phoenix Gazette columnist would later label this "the most devastating response to a potentially troublesome political issue I've ever heard."⁵⁴ With the assistance of some local political endorsements and his Washington connections, as well as effective television advertising, partly financed by $167,000 that his wife lent to his campaign (which helped him outspend his opponents),⁵⁵ and with support of Tully's The Arizona Republic (the state's most powerful newspaper),⁵⁵ McCain won the highly contested primary election in September 1982.⁵⁴ By comparison, the general election two months later became an easy lopsided victory for him in the heavily Republican district.⁵⁴

The Trúc Bạch Lake monument to McCain's downing, which he saw on his return visit to Hanoi in 1985.McCain made an immediate impression in Congress. He was elected the president of the 1983 Republican freshman class of representatives.⁵⁴ He was assigned to the Committee on Interior Affairs, the Select Committee on Aging, and eventually to the chairmanship of the Republican Task Force on Indian Affairs.⁶⁴ He sponsored a number of Indian Affairs bills, dealing mainly with giving distribution of lands to reservations and tribal tax status; most of these bills were unsuccessful.⁶⁵ McCain’s politics at this point were mainly in line with President Ronald Reagan, from issues ranging from the economy to the Soviet Union;⁶⁶ however, his vote against a resolution allowing President Reagan to keep U.S. Marines deployed as part of the Multinational Force in Lebanon, on the grounds that he "[did] not foresee obtainable objectives in Lebanon," would seem prescient after the catastrophic Beirut barracks bombing a month later;⁵⁴ this vote would also start his national media reputation as a political maverick.⁵⁴ McCain won re-election to the House easily in 1984.⁵⁴ In the new term McCain got the Indian Economic Development Act of 1985 signed into law.⁶⁷ In 1985 he returned to Vietnam with Walter Cronkite for a CBS News special, and saw the monument put up next to where the famous downed "air pirate Ma Can" had been pulled from the Hanoi lake;⁶⁸ it was the first of several return trips McCain would make there.⁶⁸ In 1986 he broke ranks again in voting to successfully override Reagan's veto of the Comprehensive Anti-Apartheid Act that imposed sanctions against South Africa.⁶⁹

In 1984 McCain and his wife Cindy had their first child together, daughter Meghan. She was followed in 1986 by son John Sidney IV (known as "Jack"), and in 1988 by son James.⁷⁰ In 1991, Cindy McCain brought an abandoned three-month old girl, who badly needed medical treatment for a severe cleft palate, to the U.S. from a Bangladeshi orphanage run by Mother Teresa;⁷¹ the McCains decided to adopt her, and named her Bridget.⁷² A drawn-out adoption process began, slowed down by uncertainty over the exact fate of the girl's father,⁷³ but in 1993 the adoption was ruled final.⁷⁴ McCain then stood by his wife when she disclosed in 1994 a previous addiction to painkillers and said that she hoped the publicity would give other drug addicts courage in their struggles.⁷⁵ Beginning in the early 1990s, McCain began attending the 6,000-member North Phoenix Baptist Church in Arizona, part of the Southern Baptist Convention, later saying "[I found] the message and fundamental nature more fulfilling than I did in the Episcopal church. ... They're great believers in redemption, and so am I."⁷⁶ Nevertheless he still identified himself as Episcopalian,⁷⁶ and while Cindy and two of their children were baptized into the Baptist church, he was not.⁷⁶

U.S. Senate career begins

McCain decided to run for United States Senator from Arizona in 1986, when longtime American conservative icon and Arizona fixture Barry Goldwater retired.⁷⁷ No Republican would oppose McCain in the primary, and as described by his press secretary Torie Clarke, McCain's political strength convinced his most formidable possible Democratic opponent, Governor Bruce Babbitt, not to run for the seat.⁷⁷ Instead McCain faced a weaker opponent, former state legislator Richard Kimball, a young politician with an offbeat personality who slept on his office floor⁷⁸ and whom McCain's allies in the Arizona press characterized as having "terminal weirdness."⁷⁷ McCain's associations with Duke Tully, who by now had been disgraced for having concocted a fictitious military record, as well as revelations of father-in-law Jim Hensley's past brushes with the law, became campaign issues, but in the end McCain won the election easily with 60 percent of the vote to Kimball's 40 percent.⁷⁷[55]

Upon entering the Senate in 1987, McCain became a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, with whom he had formerly done his Navy liaison work; he also joined the Commerce Committee and the Indian Affairs Committee.⁷⁷ He often supported the Native American agenda, advocating self-governance and sovereignty, supporting Native American gambling enterprises and tribe control of adoptions. "Never deceived them," McCain once said, "They have been deceived too many times in the last 200 years."⁷⁹ McCain was a strong supporter of the Gramm-Rudman legislation that enforced automatic spending cuts in the case of budget deficits.⁸⁰

McCain soon gained national visibility. He delivered a speech about a fellow Hanoi Hilton prisoner's persistence in making an American flag despite beatings that drew audience tears and a standing ovation at the 1988 Republican National Convention.⁸¹ He was mentioned by the press as a short list vice-presidential running mate for Republican nominee George H. W. Bush,⁸¹[77] and was named chairman of Veterans for Bush.⁸² In 1989, he became a staunch defender of his friend John Tower's doomed nomination for U.S. Secretary of Defense; McCain butted heads with Moral Majority co-founder Paul Weyrich, who was challenging Tower regarding alleged heavy drinking and extramarital affairs.⁷⁷ Thus began McCain's difficult relationship with the Christian right, as he would later write that Weyrich was "a pompous self-serving son of a bitch."⁷⁷

Keating Five
McCain's upward political trajectory was jolted when he became enmeshed in the Keating Five scandal of the 1980s. In the context of the Savings and Loan crisis of that decade, Charles Keating Jr.'s Lincoln Savings and Loan Association, a subsidiary of his American Continental Corporation, was insolvent as a result of some bad loans. In order to regain solvency, Lincoln sold investment in a real estate venture as an FDIC-insured savings account. This caught the eye of federal regulators who were looking to shut it down. It is alleged that Keating contacted five senators to whom he made contributions. McCain was one of those senators and he met at least twice in 1987 with Ed Gray, chairman of the Federal Home Loan Bank Board, seeking to prevent the government's seizure of Lincoln.

Between 1982 and 1987, McCain received approximately $112,000 in political contributions from Keating and his associates.⁸³ In addition, McCain's wife and her father had invested $359,100 in a Keating shopping center in April 1986, a year before McCain met with the regulators. McCain, his family and baby-sitter made at least nine trips at Keating's expense, sometimes aboard the American Continental jet. After learning Keating was in trouble over Lincoln, McCain paid for the air trips totaling $13,433.⁸⁴

McCain and some of his family at the September 1992 christening of USS John S. McCain at Bath Iron Works in Maine. Left to right, John McCain; his mother Roberta McCain; his son Jack; his daughter Meghan, ship's maid of honor; and his wife Cindy McCain, ship's sponsor.Eventually the real estate venture failed, leaving many broke. Federal regulators ultimately filed a $1.1 billion civil racketeering and fraud suit against Keating, accusing him of siphoning Lincoln's deposits to his family and into political campaigns. The five senators came under investigation for attempting to influence the regulators. In the end, none of the senators were convicted of any crime, although McCain was rebuked by the Senate Ethics Committee for exercising "poor judgment" in intervening with the federal regulators on Keating's behalf.⁸⁵ Robert S. Bennett, who was the special investigator during the scandal, said that he fully investigated McCain back then and suggested to the Senate Ethics Committee to not pursue charges against McCain. Bennett, a Democrat who would represent McCain in the future for another matter, wrote years later in his autobiography that it was his opinion that McCain was not dismissed from the case because without him, the investigation would have solely been against Democrats.⁸⁶

On his Keating Five experience, McCain said: "The appearance of it was wrong. It's a wrong appearance when a group of senators appear in a meeting with a group of regulators, because it conveys the impression of undue and improper influence. And it was the wrong thing to do."⁸⁵

McCain survived the political scandal by, in part, becoming friendly with the political press;⁸⁷ with his blunt manner, he became a frequent guest on television news shows, especially once the 1991 Gulf War began and his military and POW experience became in demand.⁸⁷ McCain began campaigning against lobbyist money in politics from then on. His 1992 re-election campaign found his opposition split between Democratic community and civil rights activist Claire Sargent and impeached and removed former Governor Evan Mecham running as an independent.⁸⁷ Although Mecham garnered some hard-core conservative support, Sargent's campaign never gathered momentum and the Keating Five affair did not dominate discussion.⁸⁷[88] McCain again won handily,⁸⁷ getting 56 percent of the vote to Sargent's 32 percent and Mecham's 11 percent.

A "maverick" senator

In January 1993 McCain was named chairman of the board of directors of the International Republican Institute,⁸⁹ a non-profit democracy promotion organization with informal ties to the Republican party. The position would allow McCain to bolster his foreign policy expertise and credentials.⁸⁹

McCain also branched out and worked with Democratic senators. He was a member of the 1991–1993 Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs, chaired by Democrat and fellow Vietnam War veteran John Kerry, convened to investigate the fate of U.S. service personnel listed as missing in action during the Vietnam War. The committee's work included more visits to Vietnam and getting the Department of Defense to declassify over a million pages of relevant documents.⁹⁰ The committee's final report, which McCain endorsed, stated that, "While the Committee has some evidence suggesting the possibility a POW may have survived to the present, and while some information remains yet to be investigated, there is, at this time, no compelling evidence that proves that any American remains alive in captivity in Southeast Asia."⁹¹ After many years of disliking Kerry due to his actions with Vietnam Veterans Against the War,⁹² McCain developed "unbounded respect and admiration" for Kerry during the hearings.⁹²[93] The actions of the committee were designed to allow for improved ties between the two countries.⁹⁴ McCain pressed for normalization of diplomatic relations with Vietnam, partly because it was "a time to heal ... it's a way of ending the war; it's time to move on,"⁹⁵ and partly because he saw it in the U.S. national interest to do so,⁹⁵ in particular envisioning Vietnam as a valuable regional counterbalance against China.⁹⁶ In 1994 the Senate passed a resolution, sponsored by Kerry and McCain, that called for an end to the existing trade embargo against Vietnam; it was intended to pave the way for normalization.⁹⁷ During his time on the committee and afterward, McCain was vilified as a fraud,⁹⁵ traitor,⁹² or "Manchurian Candidate"⁹⁶ by some POW/MIA activists who believed that there were large numbers of American servicemen still being held against their will in Southeast Asia.⁹⁵ McCain said that he and Kerry had gotten the Vietnamese to give them full access to their records, and that he had spent thousands of hours trying to find real, not fabricated, evidence of surviving Americans.⁹⁰ In 1995, President Bill Clinton normalized diplomatic relations with the country of Vietnam,⁹⁶ with McCain's and Kerry's visible support during the announcement giving Clinton, who came of age during Vietnam but did not serve in the military, some political cover.⁹⁶[92]

Having survived the Keating Five scandal, McCain made attacking the corrupting influence of big money on American politics his signature issue.⁶⁹ Starting in late 1994 he worked with Democratic Wisconsin Senator Russ Feingold on campaign finance reform;⁶⁹ their McCain-Feingold bill would attempt to put limits on "soft money", funds that corporations, unions, and other organizations could donate to political parties, which would then be funneled to political candidates in circumvention of "hard money" donation limits.⁶⁹ From the start, McCain and Feingold's efforts were opposed by large money interests, by incumbents in both parties, by those who felt spending limits impinged on free political speech, and by those who wanted to lessen the power of what they saw as media bias.⁶⁹ On the other hand, it garnered considerable sympathetic coverage in the national media, and from 1995 on, "maverick Republican" became a label frequently applied to McCain in stories.⁶⁹ He has used the term himself, and in fact one of the chapters in his 2002 book Worth the Fighting For is titled "Maverick".⁹⁸ The first version of the McCain-Feingold Act was introduced into the Senate in September 1995; it was filibustered in 1996 and never came to a vote.⁹⁹

McCain also attacked pork barrel spending within Congress, believing that the practice did not contribute to the greater national interest.⁶⁹ Towards this end he was instrumental in pushing through approval of the Line Item Veto Act of 1996,⁶⁹ which gave the president the power to veto individual items of pork. Although this was one of McCain's biggest Senate victories,⁶⁹ the effect was short-lived as the U.S. Supreme Court ruled the act unconstitutional in 1998.¹⁰⁰ In a more symbolic attempt to limit congressional privilege, he introduced an amendment in 1994 to remove free VIP parking for members of Congress at D.C. area airports; his annoyed colleagues rejected the notion and accused McCain of grandstanding.⁶⁹ McCain was one of only four Republicans in Congress to vote against the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act in 1995,¹⁰¹ and was the only Republican senator to vote against the Freedom to Farm Act in 1996.¹⁰² He was one of only five senators to vote against the Telecommunications Act of 1996.¹⁰³

At the start of the 1996 presidential election, McCain served as national campaign chairman for the highly unsuccessful Republican nomination effort of Texas Senator Phil Gramm.¹⁰⁴ After Gramm dropped out, McCain endorsed eventual nominee Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole,¹⁰⁴ and was again on the short list of possible vice-presidential picks.¹⁰⁵[87] McCain formed a close bond with Dole, based in part on their shared near-death war experiences;¹⁰⁵ he nominated Dole at the 1996 Republican National Convention and was a key friend and advisor to Dole throughout his ultimately losing general election campaign.¹⁰⁵

In 1997, McCain became chairman of the powerful Senate Commerce Committee; he was criticized for accepting funds from corporations and businesses under the committee's purview,⁶⁹ but responded by saying that, "Literally every business in America falls under the Commerce Committee" and that he restricted those contributions to $1,000 and thus was not part of the big-money nature of the campaign finance problem.⁶⁹ In that year, Time magazine named McCain as one of the "25 Most Influential People in America".¹⁰⁶ McCain used his chairmanship to take on the tobacco industry in 1998, proposing legislation that would increase cigarette taxes in order to fund anti-smoking campaigns and reduce the number of teenage smokers, increase research money on health studies, and help states pay for smoking-related health care costs.¹⁰⁷[69] The industry spent some $40–50 million in national advertising in response;¹⁰⁷[69] while McCain's bill had the support of the Clinton administration and many public health groups, most Republican senators opposed it, stating it would create an unwieldy new bureaucracy.¹⁰⁷ The bill failed to gain cloture twice¹⁰⁷ and was seen as a bad political defeat for McCain.¹⁰⁷ During 1998 a revised version of the McCain-Feingold Act came up for Senate consideration, but while having majority support it again fell victim to a filibuster and failed to gain cloture.⁹⁹

McCain easily won re-election to a third senate term in November 1998, gaining 69 percent of the vote to 27 percent for his Democratic opponent, environmental lawyer Ed Ranger.⁶⁹ Ranger was a motorcycle enthusiast¹⁰⁸ and political novice who had only recently returned from Mexico.¹⁰⁹ McCain took no "soft money" during the campaign, but still raised $4.4 million for his bid, explaining that he had needed it in case the tobacco companies or other Washington special interests mounted a strong effort against him.⁶⁹ One of Ranger's campaigning points had been that McCain was really more interested in running for president;⁶⁹ McCain indeed created a presidential exploratory committee the following month.¹⁰⁸

During 1999, the McCain-Feingold Act once again came up for consideration, but the same failure to gain cloture befell it again.⁹⁹ During that year, McCain shared the Profile in Courage Award with Feingold for their work in trying to enact this campaign finance reform; McCain was cited for opposing his own party on the bill at a time when he was trying to win the party's presidential nomination.¹¹⁰

2000 presidential campaign
Main article: John McCain presidential campaign, 2000
McCain had initially planned on announcing his candidacy and beginning active campaigning in April 1999, but the state of the U.S. involvement in the Kosovo War caused him to simply state without fanfare that he would be a candidate¹¹¹ on September 27, 1999 in Nashua, New Hampshire,¹¹². He stated his purpose staging "a fight to take our government back from the power brokers and special interests and return it to the people and the noble cause of freedom it was created to serve."¹¹³ There was a crowded field of Republican candidates, but the big leader in terms of establishment party support and fundraising was Texas Governor and presidential son George W. Bush.¹¹⁴

McCain skipped the Iowa caucus, where his lack of base party support would hurt him in organizing, and focused instead on the New Hampshire primary, where his message held appeal to independents and where Bush's father had never been very popular.¹¹⁵ He traveled on a campaign bus called the Straight Talk Express, whose name capitalized on his reputation as a political maverick who would speak his mind. McCain was accessible to the press, using free media to compensate for his lack of funds;¹¹³ as one reporter later recounted, "McCain talked all day long with reporters on his Straight Talk Express bus; he talked so much that sometimes he said things that he shouldn't have, and that's why the media loved him."¹¹⁶ On February 1, 2000, he won the primary with 49 percent of the vote to Bush's 30 percent, and suddenly was the celebrity of the hour. Other Republican candidates had dropped out or failed to gain traction, and McCain became Bush's only serious opponent. Analysts predicted that a McCain victory in the crucial South Carolina primary might give his insurgency campaign unstoppable momentum;¹¹⁷[118]¹¹⁹ a degree of fear and panic crept into not only the Bush campaign¹¹³ but also the Republican establishment and movement conservatism.¹¹⁸[119]

The battle between Bush and McCain for South Carolina has entered American political lore as one of the nastiest, dirtiest, and most brutal ever.¹¹³[120]¹²¹ A variety of business and interest groups that McCain had challenged in the past now pounded McCain with negative ads.¹¹³ The day that a new poll showed McCain five points ahead in the state,¹²² Bush allied himself on stage with a marginal and controversial veterans activist named J. Thomas Burch, who accused McCain of having "abandoned the veterans" on POW/MIA and Agent Orange issues: "He came home from Vietnam and forgot us."¹¹³[122] Incensed,¹²² McCain ran ads accusing Bush of lying and comparing Bush to Bill Clinton,¹¹³ which Bush complained was "about as low a blow as you can give in a Republican primary."¹¹³ An unidentified party began a semi-underground smear campaign against McCain, delivered by push polls, faxes, e-mails, flyers, and the like, claiming most famously that he had fathered a black child out of wedlock (the McCains' dark-skinned daughter Bridget was adopted from Bangladesh; this misrepresentation was thought to be an especially effective slur in a Deep South state where race was still central¹²¹), but also that his wife Cindy was a drug addict, that he was a homosexual, and that he was a "Manchurian Candidate" traitor or mentally unstable from his North Vietnam POW days.¹¹³[120] The Bush campaign strongly denied any involvement with these attacks;¹²⁰ Bush said he would fire anyone who ran defamatory push polls.¹²³ Bush mobilized the state's evangelical voters,¹¹³ and leading conservative broadcaster Rush Limbaugh entered the fray supporting Bush and going on at length about how McCain was a favorite of liberal Democrats.¹²⁴ Polls swung in Bush's favor; by not accepting federal matching funds for his campaign, Bush was not limited in how much money he could spend on advertisements, while McCain was near his limit.¹²⁴ With three days to go, McCain shut down his negative ads against Bush and tried to stress a positive image.¹²⁴ McCain lost South Carolina on February 19, with 42 percent of the vote against Bush's 53 percent,¹²⁵ allowing Bush to regain the momentum.¹²⁵

McCain would say of the rumor spreaders, "I believe that there is a special place in hell for people like those."⁷² McCain regretted some aspects of his own campaign there as well, in particular changing his stance on flying the Confederate flag at the state capitol from a "very offensive" "symbol of racism and slavery" to "a symbol of heritage";¹¹³[120] he would later write, "I feared that if I answered honestly, I could not win the South Carolina primary. So I chose to compromise my principles."¹²⁰ According to one report, the South Carolina experience overall left McCain in a "very dark place."¹²⁰

McCain's campaign never completely recovered from his defeat in South Carolina, although he did rebound partially by winning in Arizona and Michigan on February 22,¹²⁶ and capturing many Democratic and independent votes in the latter;¹²⁶ however, he made serious mistakes that negated any momentum he may have regained with the Michigan victory. Still reeling from his South Carolina experience, he made a February 28 speech in Virginia Beach that criticized as divisive conservative Christian leaders such as Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell,¹²⁰ declaring "... we embrace the fine members of the religious conservative community. But that does not mean that we will pander to their self-appointed leaders."¹²⁷ McCain lost the Virginia primary on February 29, as well as one in Washington.¹²⁸ A week later on March 7, 2000, he lost nine of the thirteen primaries on Super Tuesday to Bush, including large states such as California, New York, Ohio, and Georgia; McCain's wins were confined to the New England states of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut and Vermont.¹²⁹ His overall loss on that day has been attributed to his going "off message", ineffectively accusing Bush of being anti-Catholic due to having visited Bob Jones University¹³⁰ and getting into a verbal battle with leaders of the Religious Right.¹³¹ With no hope of catching Bush's delegate lead after Super Tuesday, McCain withdrew from the race on March 9, 2000.¹³²

Senate career, 2001–present

Activities during first Bush term, 2001-2004

With no love lost between them, McCain began 2001 by breaking against the new George W. Bush administration on a number of matters.¹³⁴ In January 2001 the latest iteration of McCain-Feingold was introduced into the Senate; it was opposed by Bush and most of the Republican establishment,¹³⁴ but helped by the 2000 election results, it passed the Senate in one form until procedural obstacles delayed it again.¹³⁵ In these few months McCain also opposed Bush on an HMO reform bill, on climate change measures, and on gun legislation.¹³⁴ Then in May 2001, McCain voted against the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001,¹³⁶ Bush's $350 billion in tax breaks over 11 years, which became known as "the Bush tax cuts". He was one of only two Republicans to do so,¹³⁴ saying that "I cannot in good conscience support a tax cut in which so many of the benefits go to the most fortunate among us, at the expense of middle class Americans who most need tax relief."¹³⁷[136] Then when Republican Senator Jim Jeffords became an Independent, throwing control of the Senate to Democrats, McCain defended him against "self-appointed enforcers of party loyalty."¹³⁴ Indeed, there was speculation at the time,¹³⁸ and in years since,¹³⁹ about McCain himself possibly leaving the Republican Party during the first half of 2001. Accounts have differed as to who initiated any discussions, and McCain has always adamantly denied, then and later, that he ever considered doing so.¹³⁴[139] In any case, all of this was enough for conservative Arizonan critics of McCain to organize rallies and recalls against him in May and June 2001.¹³⁴

After the September 11, 2001 attacks, McCain became a supporter of Bush and an advocate for strong military measures against those responsible with respect to the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan;¹³⁴ in a high-profile¹³⁴ late October 2001 Wall Street Journal op-ed piece he wrote, "America is under attack by a depraved, malevolent force that opposes our every interest and hates every value we hold dear." After advocating an overwhelming, not incremental, approach against the Taliban in Afghanistan, including the use of ground forces, he concluded, "War is a miserable business. Let's get on with it."¹⁴⁰ He and Democratic Senator Joe Lieberman wrote the legislation that created the 9/11 Commission,¹⁴¹ while he and Democratic Senator Fritz Hollings co-sponsored the Aviation and Transportation Security Act that federalized airport security under what became the Transportation Security Administration.¹⁴²

McCain-Feingold had been yet further delayed by the effects of September 11.¹³⁵ Finally in March 2002, aided by the aftereffects of the Enron scandal, it passed both House and Senate and, known formally as the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act, was signed into law by President Bush.¹³⁴ Seven years in the making, it was McCain's greatest legislative achievement¹³⁴ and had become, in the words of one biographer, "one of the most famous pieces of federal legislation in modern American political history."¹⁴³

Meanwhile, in discussions over proposed U.S. action against Iraq, McCain was a strong supporter of the Bush position, labeling Saddam Hussein "a megalomaniacal tyrant whose cruelty and offense to the norms of civilization are infamous."¹³⁴ Unequivocally stating that Iraq had substantial weapons of mass destruction, McCain stated that Iraq was "a clear and present danger to the United States of America."¹³⁴ Accordingly he voted for the Iraq War Resolution in October 2002.¹³⁴ Both before and immediately after the Iraq War started in March 2003, McCain agreed with the Bush administration's assertions that the U.S. forces would be treated as liberators by most of the Iraqi people.¹⁴⁴ In May 2003, McCain voted against the Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2003, the second round of Bush tax cuts which served to extend and accelerate the first (which he had also voted against), saying it was unwise at a time of war.¹³⁶ By November 2003, after a trip to Iraq, McCain was publicly questioning Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's handling of the Iraq War, saying that "All of the trends are in the wrong direction" and that more U.S. troops were needed to handle the deteriorating situation in the Sunni Triangle.¹⁴⁵ By December 2004, McCain was bluntly announcing that he had lost confidence in Rumsfeld.¹⁴⁶

In the 2004 U.S. presidential election, McCain was once again frequently mentioned for the vice-presidential slot, only this time as part of the Democratic ticket underneath nominee John Kerry.¹⁴⁷[148] Kerry and McCain had been close since their work on the early 1990s Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs, and the pairing was seen as having great allure to independent voters,¹⁴⁷ with polls seeming to confirm the notion.¹⁴⁸ In June 2004, it was reported that Kerry had informally offered the slot to McCain several times, but McCain had declined, either on grounds that it would be infeasible and weaken the presidency¹⁴⁸ or that the vice-presidency held no appeal for McCain.¹⁴⁷ McCain's office formally denied that any vice-presidential offer had taken place.¹⁴⁸ At the 2004 Republican National Convention, McCain enthusiastically supported Bush for re-election,¹⁴⁹ praising Bush's management of the War on Terror since the September 11 attacks.¹⁴⁹ At the same time, McCain defended Kerry by labeling the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign against Kerry's Vietnam war record as "dishonest and dishonorable" and urging the Bush campaign to condemn it.¹⁵⁰ By August 2004, McCain had the best favorable-to-unfavorable rating (55 percent to 19 percent) of any national politician.¹⁴⁹

McCain was himself up for re-election as Senator in 2004. There was some talk of Representative Jeff Flake mounting a Republican primary challenge against McCain;¹⁴⁶ Stephen Moore, president of the ideologically-oriented Club for Growth (which attempts to defeat those it considers Republican in Name Only), led talk for the prospect,¹⁵¹ saying "Our members loathe John McCain."¹⁵² Flake decided not to do it, later saying "I would have been whipped."¹⁵¹ In the general election McCain had his biggest margin of victory yet, garnering 77 percent of the vote against little-known Democrat Stuart Starky, an eighth grade math teacher¹⁵³ whom The Arizona Republic termed a "sacrificial lamb".¹⁴⁶ Exit polls showed that McCain even won a majority of the votes cast by Democrats.¹⁵⁴

Following his 2000 presidential campaign, McCain made frequent appearances on entertainment programs on television and also in film, and even more so after 2004.¹⁴⁶ He hosted the October 12, 2002, episode of Saturday Night Live, making him the third U.S. Senator after Paul Simon and George McGovern, to host the show.

Activities during second Bush term, 2005-2007
He has been a regular guest on The Daily Show; as of 2006 he had been on that show eleven times, more than anyone else. McCain appeared in slightly edgy bits on Late Night with Conan O'Brien,¹⁵⁵ and also appeared several times on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and the Late Show with David Letterman.¹⁵⁶ McCain made a brief cameo on the television show 24 in 2006¹⁵⁶ and also made a cameo in the 2005 summer movie Wedding Crashers. In more serious fare, a television film entitled Faith Of My Fathers, based on McCain's memoir of his experiences as a POW, aired on Memorial Day, 2005, on A&E.¹⁵⁷ McCain was also interviewed in the 2005 documentary Why We Fight by Eugene Jarecki.¹⁵⁸

On judicial appointments, McCain was long a believer in judges who “would strictly interpret the Constitution,” and accordingly over the years would support the confirmations of Robert Bork, Clarence Thomas, John Roberts, and Samuel Alito.¹⁵⁹ McCain also drew the ire of the originalist and similar legal movements in the U.S. in May 2005, however, when he led the so-called "Gang of 14" in the Senate, which established a compromise that preserved the ability of senators to filibuster judicial nominees, but only in "extraordinary circumstances." Breaking from his 2001 and 2003 votes, McCain supported the Bush tax cut extension in May 2006, known as the Tax Increase Prevention and Reconciliation Act of 2005, saying not to do so would amount to a tax increase.¹³⁶ Working with Democratic Senator Ted Kennedy, McCain was a strong proponent of comprehensive immigration reform, which would involve legalization, guest worker programs, and border enforcement components: the Secure America and Orderly Immigration Act was never voted on in 2005, while the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2006 passed the Senate in May 2006 but then failed in the House.¹⁴⁶ In June 2007, President Bush, McCain and others made the strongest push yet for such a bill, the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2007, but it aroused tremendous grassroots opposition among talk radio listeners and others as an "amnesty" program, and twice failed to gain cloture in the Senate and thus failed.

In Baghdad with General David Petraeus, November 2007.Owing to his time as a POW, McCain has been recognized for his sensitivity to the detention and interrogation of detainees in the War on Terror. On October 3, 2005, McCain introduced the McCain Detainee Amendment to the Defense Appropriations bill for 2005. On October 5, 2005, the United States Senate voted 90-9 to support the amendment.¹⁶⁰ The amendment prohibits inhumane treatment of prisoners, including prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, by confining interrogations to the techniques in FM 34-52 Intelligence Interrogation.

Although Bush had threatened to veto the bill if McCain's language was included,¹⁶¹ the President announced on December 15, 2005 that he accepted McCain's terms and would "make it clear to the world that this government does not torture and that we adhere to the international convention of torture, whether it be here at home or abroad."¹⁶² Bush made clear his interpretation of this legislation in a signing statement, reserving what he interpreted to be his Presidential constitutional authority in order to avoid further terrorist attacks.¹⁶³ Meanwhile, McCain continued questioning the progress of the war in Iraq. In September 2005, he questioned Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Richard Myers' habit of optimistic outlooks on the war's progress: "Things have not gone as well as we had planned or expected, nor as we were told by you, General Myers."¹⁶⁴ In August 2006 he criticized the administration for continually understating the effectiveness of the insurgency: "We [have] not told the American people how tough and difficult this could be."¹⁴⁶ From the beginning McCain strongly supported the Iraq troop surge of 2007;¹⁶⁵ the strategy's opponents labeled it "McCain's plan"¹⁶⁶ and University of Virginia political science professor Larry Sabato said, "McCain owns Iraq just as much as Bush does now."¹⁴⁶ The surge and the war were quite unpopular during most of the year, even within the Republican Party,¹⁶⁷ as McCain's presidential campaign was underway; faced with the consequences, McCain frequently responded, "I would much rather lose a campaign than a war."¹⁶⁸

2008 presidential campaign

McCain established his presidential exploratory committee on November 15, 2006,¹⁴⁶ then announced he was seeking the 2008 Presidential nomination from the Republican Party on the February 28, 2007, telecast of the Late Show With David Letterman.¹⁶⁹[170] McCain officially started his 2008 presidential campaign on April 25, 2007, in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Should McCain win in 2008, he would be the oldest person to assume the Presidency in history at initial ascension to office, being 72 years old and surpassing Ronald Reagan, who was 69 years old at his inauguration following the 1980 election. He has dismissed concerns about his age and past health concerns (malignant melanoma in 2000), stating in 2005 that his health was "excellent."¹⁷¹[172] In the event of his victory in 2008, he would also become the first President of the United States to be born in a U.S. territory outside of the current 50 states (see natural-born citizens).

McCain's oft-cited strengths¹⁷³ as a presidential candidate for 2008 included national name recognition, sponsorship of major lobbying and campaign finance reform initiatives, leadership in exposing the Abramoff scandal,¹⁷⁴ his well-known military service and experience as a POW, his experience from the 2000 presidential campaign, extensive fundraising abilities, and strong advocacy for President Bush's re-election campaign in 2004. During the 2006 election cycle, McCain attended 346 events⁴⁵ and raised more than $10.5 million on behalf of Republican candidates. He also donated nearly $1.5 million to federal, state and county parties. In a bid to finally gain support from the Christian right, McCain gave the May 2006 commencement address at Jerry Falwell's Liberty University. During his 2000 presidential bid, McCain had called Falwell an "agent of intolerance"; McCain now said that Falwell was no longer as divisive and the two have discussed their shared values.¹⁷⁵ McCain was also more willing to ask business and industry for campaign contributions, counting more lobbyists as fundraisers than any other candidate,¹⁷⁶ while maintaining adamantly that such contributions would not affect any senatorial decisions he made.¹⁷⁶

McCain's second-quarter 2007 fundraising totals fell from $13.6 million in the first quarter to $11.2 million in the second, and expenses continuing such that only $2 million cash was on hand with about $1 million¹⁷⁷ in debts. Both McCain supporters and political observers pointed to McCain's support for the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2007, very unpopular among the Republican base electorate, as a primary cause of his fundraising problems.¹⁷⁸[179] Large-scale campaign staff downsizing took place in early July, with 50 to 100 staffers let go and others taking pay cuts or switching to no pay. McCain's aides said the campaign was considering taking public matching funds, and would focus its efforts on the early primary and caucus states. McCain however said he was not considering dropping out of the race.¹⁸⁰[181] Campaign shakeups reached the top level on July 10, 2007, when his campaign manager and campaign chief strategist both departed.¹⁸²

McCain subsequently resumed his familiar position as a political underdog, embracing a "Living Off the Land" strategy that called for McCain to ride the Straight Talk Express and take advantage of free media such as debates and sponsored events.¹⁸³ By December 2007, the Republican race was quite unsettled, with none of the top-tier candidates dominating the race and all of them possessing major vulnerabilities with different elements of the Republican base electorate.¹⁸⁴ McCain was showing a resurgence, in particular with renewed strength in New Hampshire – scene of his 2000 triumph – and was bolstered further by the endorsements of The Boston Globe, the Manchester Union-Leader, and almost two dozen other state newspapers,¹⁸⁵ as well as from Independent Democrat Senator Joe Lieberman.¹⁸⁶ All of this paid off when McCain won the New Hampshire primary on January 8, 2008, beating former Governor of Massachusetts Mitt Romney in a close contest, to once again become one of the front-runners in the race.¹⁸⁷ On January 19, McCain placed first in the South Carolina primary, narrowly defeating former Governor of Arkansas Mike Huckabee, and thereby reversing his loss there in 2000.¹⁸⁸ He followed this up with another win a week later in the Florida primary,¹⁸⁹ beating Romney again in a close, negative and attack-filled contest, thereby making him the front-runner in the nomination race.¹⁸⁹ Following this victory, rival Rudy Giuliani announced he was dropping out of the race and cast his support for McCain's candidacy.¹⁹⁰ As of February 2, McCain had an overall 97–92 lead over Romney in delegates to the 2008 Republican National Convention.¹⁹¹ On February 5, Super Tuesday, McCain won both the majority of states and delegates in the Republican primaries, giving him a commanding lead toward the Republican nomination. With Mitt Romney's departure from the race on February 7,¹⁹² McCain is widely regarded as the presumptive Republican nominee, although Mike Huckabee and Ron Paul remain in the race.

In February 2008, The New York Times and The Washington Post reported on McCain's connection with a lobbyist in 2000. The Times came under significant criticism for the report.¹⁹³[194]

Political positions
Main article: Political positions of John McCain
Several organizations have attempted to scientifically measure McCain's place on the political spectrum:

National Journal's studies of roll-call votes through 2006 assigned McCain a lifetime rating of 72 in the political spectrum, relative to the then-current Senate, with a rating of 1 being most liberal and 100 being most conservative.¹⁹⁵ (McCain did not receive a National Journal ranking in 2007 due to missing too many votes because of campaigning.¹⁹⁶)
A 2004 analysis by political scientists Joshua D. Clinton of Princeton University and Simon Jackman and Doug Rivers of Stanford University found McCain to be likely the 51st-most liberal Senator.¹⁹⁷
The Almanac of American Politics, edited by Michael Barone and Richard E. Cohen, rates votes as liberal or conservative, with 100 as the highest rating, in three policy areas: Economic, Social, and Foreign. For 2006, McCain's ratings are: Economic = 64% conservative, 35% liberal (2005: 52% conservative, 47% liberal);¹⁹⁸ Social = 46% conservative, 53% liberal (2005: 64% conservative, 23% liberal);¹⁹⁸ Foreign = 58% conservative, 40% liberal (2005: 54% conservative, 45% liberal).¹⁹⁸

Assessments by political interest groups

Various interest groups have given Senator McCain scores or grades as to how well his votes align with the positions of the group:

McCain has received a lifetime American Conservative Union rating of 82 percent through 2006¹⁹⁹ (see chart for progression over time).
Through 2007, McCain has received a lifetime 13 percent "Liberal Quotient" from Americans for Democratic Action²⁰⁰ (see chart for progression over time).
The National Right to Life Committee gives McCain a lifetime 72 percent rating from 1997 through 2007,²⁰¹ while NARAL Pro-Choice America gives him a lifetime 1 percent rating from 1987 through 2007.²⁰²
Americans for Better Immigration has given him a lifetime grade of 'D' (near failing) for 1989 through early 2008 on their Immigration-Reduction Report Card.²⁰³
The National Rifle Association gave McCain a 'C' grade (fair) as of 2004,²⁰⁴ and the Gun Owners of America gives a lifetime 'D-' (very near failing) grade for 2000 through 2006.²⁰⁵
The American Civil Liberties Union has given McCain a lifetime 22 percent score through early 2008.²⁰⁶
The League of Conservation Voters has given him a lifetime 24 percent pro-environment action rating through 2007.²⁰⁷
Ratings of McCain's votes from a number of other interest groups are tracked by Project Vote Smart.²⁰⁸

In the 2000 elections, many thought of Bush as the more conservative candidate and McCain as the more moderate candidate.²⁰⁹ His voting record during the 107th Congress, from January 2001 through November 2002, placed him as the sixth most liberal Republican senator, according to Voteview.com.²¹⁰ McCain's voting record in the 109th Congress was the second most conservative among senators, according to the same analysis.²¹¹

Positions on specific issues
McCain has many traditionally Republican views. He has a strong conservative voting record on pro-life²¹² and free trade issues, favors private social security accounts, and opposes an expanded government role in health care. McCain also supports school vouchers, capital punishment, mandatory sentencing, and welfare reform. He is generally regarded as a hawk in foreign policy. When a questioner said, "President Bush has talked about our staying in Iraq for 50 years." McCain responded, "Make it a hundred. We've been in Japan for 60 years, we've been in South Korea for 50 years or so. That'd be fine with me as long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed. That's fine with me. I hope it will be fine with you if we maintain a presence in a very volatile part of the world where Al Qaeda is training, recruiting, equipping, and motivating people every single day."²¹³

Nevertheless, McCain has supported liberal legislation opposed by his own party and has been called a "maverick" by certain members of the American media.²¹⁴ Arizona Republic columnist and RealClearPolitics contributor Robert Robb, using a formulation devised by William F. Buckley, describes McCain as "conservative" but not "a conservative", meaning that while McCain usually tends towards conservative positions, he is not "anchored by the philosophical tenets of modern American conservatism."²¹⁵ McCain declined to sign the pledge put forward by Americans for Tax Freedom not to impose any new taxes or increase existing taxes.²¹⁶

McCain's reputation as a maverick stems primarily from his authorship of the McCain-Feingold Act for campaign finance reform and his stance on illegal immigration.²¹⁷

McCain's views about abortion have also fluctuated; in 1999, he said of Roe v. Wade, "in the short term, or even the long term, I would not support repeal of Roe v. Wade,"²¹⁸ but in 2007 McCain stated "It should be overturned."²¹⁹

In 2007, McCain co-sponsored controversial legislation with Senator Ted Kennedy known as the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2007 which would have allowed tens of millions of illegal immigrants already in the United States a path to citizenship. Further, the Washington Post reports that McCain and South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham "first checked with Mr. Kennedy before deciding to vote with the Massachusetts Democrat on an amendment to the Senate bill".²²⁰

McCain has been a lead sponsor of gun control legislation as well as what organizations including Gun Owners of America argue are restrictions on the free speech of pro-Second Amendment organizations²²¹ even earning an F- rating from Gun Owners of America. Yet in the past McCain had voted against the passage and renewal of the Federal Assault Weapons Ban and the Brady Bill.²²²[223]

McCain voted against President Bush's tax cuts in 2001 and 2003, though he voted to extend the tax breaks in 2005.²²⁴

McCain has been an opponent of the Bush administration's use of "enhanced interrogation techniques" in the War on Terror, and has specifically referred to waterboarding as torture,²²⁵[226] though he later voted against banning the procedure and others.²²⁷ He has also said that he intends to "immediately close" the Guantanamo Bay detainment camp.²²⁸

Cultural, political, and family image
According to political scientist John Karaagac, public service is idealized in military tradition, whereas politics is deprecated, and this was the tradition in McCain's family. Karaagac believes that this tradition is reflected in the fact that, "As Senator, he understands how to play the game of politics by knowing when to appear above the fracas."²²⁹ After many years of observing McCain, New York Times columnist David Brooks writes that "there is nobody in politics remotely like him," making reference to his energy and dynamism, his rebelliousness and desire to battle powerful political forces, his willingness to endlessly and truthfully talk with reporters, and his being "driven by an ancient sense of honor."²³⁰ Brooks does not see McCain without political fault, and explains that, "There have been occasions when McCain compromised his principles for political gain, but he was so bad at it that it always backfired."²³⁰ Similarly, Vanity Fair national editor Todd Purdum believes that McCain has tried to tame his maverick impulses in order to conform more with "the orthodoxies required of a Republican presidential front-runner," and compares it to squaring the circle: "McCain needs to square that circle, and the hell of it is, he just can't."⁴⁵

McCain's own emphasis on personal character was revealed in a University of Missouri-Columbia study of political discourse in the 2000 Republican primary campaign, which showed McCain using fewer policy, and more character, utterances than any other candidate.²³¹ Reason and Los Angeles Times writer Matt Welch, author of McCain: The Myth of a Maverick, sees political pundits as projecting their own ideological fantasies upon McCain.²³² Welch sees Theodore Roosevelt as a role model for McCain, so that "sublimating the individual" in the common cause will be a guiding principle, which may align him with liberals in one instance and conservatives in the next, on the way to a statist result.²³³

McCain has a history, beginning with his military career, of appealing to lucky charms and superstitions to gain fortune. While serving in Vietnam, he demanded that his parachute rigger clean his visor before each flight. On the 2000 campaign, he carried a lucky compass, feather, shoes, pen, penny and, at times, a rock. An incident when McCain misplaced his feather caused a brief panic in the campaign.²³⁴ The night before the 2008 New Hampshire primary he slept on the same side of the bed in the same hotel room he had stayed in before his win there in 2000,²³⁵ and after winning carried some of his talismans forward into the following Michigan primary while adding others.²³⁶ His superstitions are extended to others; to those afraid of flying or experiencing a bumpy flight, he says, "You don't need to worry. I've crashed four fighter jets, and I'm not going to die in a plane crash. Y